Since his mother's death, Jayson, twelve, has focused on basketball and surviving but he is found out and placed with an affluent foster family of a different race, and must learn to accept many changes, including facing his former teammates in a championship game.

At the center of this beautiful package is the short, tender story of Timmy and his shoe box. At first glance, it's nothing special, just an ordinary box with a red lid and the words Running Shoes printed on the side. But Timmy carries it with him wherever he goes, and when people ask him what's inside, he smiles and says, “Just things.” As Timmy settles into his new, loving home, he remains unwilling to share the secrets of his shoe box . . ....

[This book] is [an] account of one of the most severe child abuse cases in California history. It is the story of Dave Pelzer, who was brutally beaten and starved by his emotionally unstable, alcoholic mother: a mother who played torturous, unpredictable games - games that left him nearly dead. He had to learn how to play his mother's games in order to survive because she no longer considered him a son, but a slave; and no longer a boy, but an "it."--Back...

Three Irish immigrant children, orphaned in a tenement fire, are sent on the orphan train to Missouri where they are adopted by different families, and although Maelle had vowed to one day reunite with her younger brother and sister, seventeen years later she is about to give up hope.

Seventeen-year-old Margaret "Cuckoo" Clark keeps a journal detailing the trials and tribulations of high school life as she and her close-knit group of outcast friends try to break down the barriers between their school's "warring nations."

The author continues the story of his own child abuse, and his experiences being a foster child moving in and out of five different foster homes.

"When Matt Freeman gets into trouble with the police, he's sent to be fostered in Yorkshire. It's not long before he senses there's something wrong with his guardian, and the entire village. Then Matt learns about the Old Ones and begins to understand just how he is different. But no one will believe him, and no one can help." --

In a series of poems, eleven-year-old Lonnie writes about his life, after the death of his parents, separated from his younger sister, living in a foster home, and finding his poetic voice at school.

"When it comes to family, Annie is in the losers bracket. While her foster parents are great (mostly), her birth family would not have been her first pick. And no matter how many times Annie tries to write them out of her life, she always gets sucked back into their drama. Love is like that. When a family argument breaks out at Annie's swim meet and her nephew goes missing, Annie might be the only one who can get him back. With help from her friends,...

"Award-winning and Boston Globe bestselling author Hank Phillippi Ryan presents a spine-chilling, heart-wrenching suspense novel that explores a terrifying scenario striking at the heart of every family. Does a respected adoption agency have a frightening secret? Tipped off by a determined ex-colleague on a desperate quest to find her birth mother, Boston newspaper reporter Jane Ryland begins to suspect that the agency is engaging in the ultimate...